PASSAGE THROUGH THE GREAT THRESHOLD SERIES, THE ETERNAL GARDEN SERIES
Passage Through The Great Threshold and Eternal Garden series explores the meaning and eternal nature of life. From the 1990s onwards, Hsiao Chin’s paintings were further focused on dialogues of emotional and spiritual experience. He tried on bright, vibrant colors and free-flowing lines that glow with the promise of a renewed spiritual life. His idiosyncratic dichotomous thinking is visually articulated to show his philosophical view on the holistic interrelationship and co-dependency between this and the other side of life.
In 1990, the accidental death of Hsiao Chin’s daughter left him in pain. However, through continuous rumination on life, it finally dawned on him that “life is eternal and does not end with death”. As a result, his painting style evolved to a totally new state. Passage Through The Great Threshold series a testimony to a new perspective on life, illustrate Hsiao Chin’s new take on life and death. The seed of eternal life continues to grow on the brighter end of the Great Threshold. The Eternal Garden series can be seen as an extension of the Passage Through The Great Threshold series in term of the aesthetic form. It showed a promised land with abundant vitality and energy – a place where artist, having been through the most devastating tragedy, finds a profound sense of spiritual belonging. When this form of life has come to an end, it will lead us into the “infinite” realm. The cycle of life will continue and the energy of life will always exist. Therefore, Samantha never left, she is just not here.